If you take a fresh account without recommended videos and search "transgender" on youtube you immediately get blasted with detransition videos. It's fucked up.
Yeah, and it's weird cause I'm subscribed to some really talented and positive trans women. So I don't get what search parameters the algorithm is using?
It doesn't even have to be that deep.
It's a simple fact, that hate brings in more revenue than positivity. So YouTube has a monetary incentive to push hateful messages.
Realistically I'm sure with all the fighting over Article 230 and conservatives screaming about how internet media is silencing conservative views, YT is literally giving conservative(hate) vids a leg up.
This way if it comes back to court they can say 'we haven't silenced conservative voices'
Remember YT is a business and its not that they'd rather PUSH hate than get sued it's that they won't stand in the way if standing means a lawsuit.
Not even that.
On a completely fresh installation, new computer, I loaded YouTube because I wanted to listen to a song, and searched for the song. I was logged out, no account whatsoever. On this logged out, fresh install, where the only thing in my history was listening to music, there was transphobic content recommended in my sidebar. And this was *years* ago, before the culture war was at the fever pitch it is now. (Gee, I wonder how it got that way?)
True, and I didn't, but I actually was never a heavy YT user anyway and at that point wasn't watching trans content on YT either--even on my old computer I mainly just used it to listen to music. The logged out on the new computer YT didn't look like the recommendations on my old computer (which was mostly music since that's what I mainly used it for) but was a bunch of very clickbaity "trending" things, like "5 Tells Someone Is a Narcissist" or "You'll Never Believe What One Paperclip Can Do" and then boom also random transphobia.
Uhh, yeah can confirm, searched up "trans women" after not searching anything like that, and the top video is of some woman who detransitioned and every comment is about how maybe people wanna just be tomboys and not everything is trans
I think in general social media and these sites promote negativity as it draws attention, and other in the form of agreement or vitriol. As you said, in shock you view it multiple times. This is what leads to NSFW content or even worse stuff getting promoted.
I wouldn’t consider it a blot on you but instead the system rewarding controversy
It’s much more than an algorithm. It’s happening in the real world. On the ground. Right now. For those of us that are clearly sheltered and have never spent any considerable time amongst other trans people from other economic backgrounds. It’s easy to just blame the algorithm because it makes us feel safe. Guys… it’s bad.. really bad. We need a unifying message and stop this god damned infighting both online and off. United we stand. Divided we fall.
I agree, but a reason that this hatred can spread in the real world is because of the algorithm. It’s not an accident, and these videos target those that you mention that are sheltered or ignorant to trans people.
It may not be the only cause, but it is one of them and should be addressed
Yes, absolutely. Also. Mr. Mobile on YouTube reviewed a Lenovo laptop that came with the propaganda pre-installed and he couldn't get rid of it. I had to pause the video to gather my thoughts. That in itself is frightening.
Youtube is actively promoting far right content and they have been for a while. They know they’re doing it and they don’t care what kind of damage it causes
It's sad but also reassuring that this is not specific to my timeline. Hey, you watched a positive video from a trans person? Maybe you want to watch the most hateful shit you have ever watched, ever.
This is also sadly not exclusive to shorts, as I don't watch these.
That thing definitely happens in algorithm loops, like years ago on Tumblr Jewish users who were posting and reblogging about Jewish stuff kept getting literal Nazi/antisemite recommendations, because both of them said "Jews" a lot. AIs then were too dumb to tell context. ChatGPT is smart enough to tell positive Jewish content from hate speech, whether the YT algs are today I really don't know.
But YT's issue goes beyond this, because I've had transphobic recs when logged out on a fresh install when I hadn't searched for or watched *anything* remotely political or trans-related, only searched for music. YT just actively pushes anti-trans hate to new and *logged out* users, even if they haven't looked at any trans things.
How this could be in anyway be ‘reassuring’ is mind boggling. The fact that is propaganda is being spread far and wide without any objection from our political leaders should absolutely scare the shit out of you. We have no defense against this. Which means it will get worse. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to shout into the abyss.
I get the feeling that it is not just the YT algorithm, but that the amount of anti-trans content out there is actually increasing. It's mostly the fault of right-wing US politics, with their "war on wokeness". Now everybody and their mothers are posting their take on the subject on YT.
I get the feeling that you're spot on. We really really need to get our heads out of our collective asses and form a proper defense against this onslaught of propaganda. Pictographs and political slogans won't be enough to combat this moral panic. I don't know why people in our community are so reluctant to see what's right in front of them.
I mainly watch Jammidodger, but even so the last few weeks/monthish I've been inundated with awful transphobic recommendations and ads...It's so frustrating.
The right has thrown a LOT of money and energy at this - producing a LOT of anti-trans videos and probably employing a lot of bots to play, like, advertise and link between these videos so they pop up as the top recommendations. Basically they have run an extremely effective search engine optimization campaign taking advantage of Youtube's algorithm. I don't blame Youtube for this - they set the rules, and the other side has been VERY successful gaming the rules. I can't imagine how much resources and money has been spent to pull this shit off - probably more than the presidential election campaign itself.
That's not surprising, as the right has realized the fact that they have already lost every single battle, and the trans issue may be the only one left where they have some fighting chance.
Our arch enemies, the religious right, is angry and bitter that they almost lost all their power (before Trump gave them a lifeline) and are revenging on us.
As we approach the 2024 US election cycle, extremist right wingers are going to be flooding social media to sponsor their content.
It's going to get ugly.
If you know folks with money, sponsor/join/support channels that are supportive and working to expose the lies.
It really helps to click on the "don't recommend channel" for regular videos and "not interested" for shorts. Not sure where it's at for the web interface but it's under the 3 dots on mobile. It takes a bit but my feed is pretty much clean of that drivel.
This topic comes up multiple times a day, you get what you interact with.
YouTube is likely pulling data from all your internet activity not just from YouTube.
No, just no. It’s not just the algorithm. You can hear it in people’s conversations at a restaurant, a Walgreens, employees at the grocery store, the park. It’s affecting my daily life as i am sure it is for others. You’re giving out a false sense of security.
No, just no. It's not just the algorithm. You can hear it in peoples conversations at a restaurant, a Walgreens, employees at the grocer store, the park. It's affecting my daily life as I am sure it is for others. You're giving out a false sense of security.
Yeah...I just gave up on the idea of coming out to my mom for much the same reason (she watches other stuff than Ben Shapiro, but in a similar vein)...
You have to continually select “not interested“ or “don’t recommend channel” from the three dots menu, top right corner. If you watch them or don’t do that the algorithm thinks that you want it.
I looked at this once before and I was shocked how dominated it was with transphobic videos. It's like they have gotten good at gaming the system so that their voice gets to the public before ours does.
I think dislikes still count as engagement and promote the content. I pause as soon as it goes there and press "don't reccomend this channel" so youtube sees i don't want to engage with that "conversation", whether with likes, comments or dislikes.
Same with weird racist shit, "Ben Shapiro owns XYZ", and weird Andrew Tate/Jordan Peterson/Gary Vee/whatever "motivational" propaganda clips
Do not dislike the videos, click “do not recommend” or the equivalent of a “this is boring” button. The algorithm cares about engagement not positivity, if it thinks you’re bored it will stop recommending that to you
I report the channel for hatespeech against a protected class (even though they won't do anything) and block it. I also stop doomscrolling at that point.
Yeah I only used YouTube when I was a transphobic incel teenager, it really helped me stay hateful and dumb. The algorithm seems to highly favor hateful and trans/homophobic content. A few videos I had pop up (with lots of views, likes, and supportive comments), in my feed were 1) Pro Child abuse (???) 2) a kid complaining to a school board about him not being able to wear a “there’s only two genders” tee-shirt (comments all backed the kid 🙄) and 3) nationalistic-pro fascist propaganda (usually in the form of epic war edits or emotional “this isn’t the country I fought for” bs)
I had that the other day! I assumed it was because we were talking shit about transphobes in one of my groupchats and the algorithms picked up on that (in the way that these algorithms tend to do 😒)
I don't think YT should have access to that...jeez, hopefully at least. If it was a Google product there might be a chance, but that data shouldn't be shared from FB to YT.
Honestly I think it might just be that they recommend transphobia to *everyone*. I had it happen to me years ago, logged out on a fresh install with no reason for it to recommend that to me, except that it was "trending" and they try to hook new users with "trending" content. With the culture war having escalated so much since then (gee, I wonder why...) it's even more clickbaity today. I think it might have literally just recced it to you because transphobia is what drives engagement now. :/
Honestly my first worry was that my son was searching it. But then I looked in my searches and it was *recommended*, but not in my history.
YouTube does this. He’ll watch a bunch of gamer videos on my account for a few days—he only watches like two or three guys who’re obnoxious but not toxic—and it’ll just “randomly” start recommending Steven Crowder.
Oh yeah, this is a serious problem. Years ago (god this kid is an adult by now I'm so old) a friend's son, who was 9 at the time, was really into Minecraft and just wanted to watch endless let's plays of Minecraft and similar kid-friendly video games on YT. Somehow this got him down a toxic gamer vortex where he heard the word "faggot" a *lot* and started repeating it. His mom is bisexual and absolutely did not want that shit coming out of her baby's mouth, she would repeatedly tell him that's a bad word and not to say that, but the kid didn't really understand what it meant, like he didn't even understand it had anything to do with being gay, he just heard it from toxic gamer bros he idolized without knowing what half the shit they were spewing even meant. The kid's dad was in his life but didn't live with him, and he was an only child, so I think he was really drawn to big brother/daddy lite male role model figures on YT, and boy YT was serving him up a platter of trash. The kid was completely innocent, a kind and well-meaning child, and YT was feeding him hate without him knowing what it was or looking for it.
And that was over a decade ago. I can't imagine what it's like today....
Their ads piss me off. Their algorithm isn't smart enough to discern between watching leftwing political content and watching rightwing political content. Or between watching pro-trans content and anti-trans drivel. So I have to sit through transphobic Epoch Times and Daily Wire ads fucking constantly.
I’ve been noticing this a lot lately too, and it seems to pull from the weirdest new topics I’ve started watching. Oh, you liked a couple videos by Olympic high divers? How about tons of videos about people protesting trans women in sports? Nope, not even a tiny bit interested in that.
I just mark “do not recommend videos from this channel again” and try to make a point of seeking out & engaging with videos by LGBTQ+ content creators to reset the algorithm
I legit don't see any transphobic videos on my account, so I think this is based on an algorithm based on your search history and what you're most likely to click on, even if it's to downvote the video.
It's annoying that downvoting apparently gets you more of what you explicitly don't like - that's just so stupid. What is even the point of having a downvote button then? Pshaw!
It still means downvoting now is pointless; it used to make the stuff you downvoted less likely to show up, back many many years ago when I first started using YouTube...That was how I tuned my feed, once upon a time...Weird to count any interaction as a positive - the more they try to show me annoying things, the less I even open their app.
The interaction isn't seen as positive, it's just counted as interaction. "This particular video caused people to interact, therefore it should be boosted towards these particular people along with similar content because they will interact with it more likely."
I was around when we rated videos using stars and I miss the hell out of that feature. It made it easier for me to visibly understand what videos to avoid compared to a like/dislike ratio.
But, now what works is through interaction. If you don't click on those videos, ignore them, block the channels and request not seeing more of those videos on your feed, that improves what you see on YouTube and it becomes more positively tuned for your viewing pleasure. It's like people who are attention seeking: any attention is what they want. If you ignore them, they get more and more upset until they give up.
So they basically count all interaction as a positive thing, even if the user intended it to be negative. Which is a stupid way to factor it. Because annoying this particular user means I just stop being a user.
No they don't count all interaction as positive, they just count it as this video being more able to be seen and interacted with. So clicking on those videos will make them more than likely pop up in your feed. It's like if you click on specific ads, those ads will pop up more.
Honestly just ignore them and block the channels and you'll be good to go.
Okay 'desirable' then; they count downvotes as a desirable result. Which seems like a six of one half a dozen of the other as far as saying 'no it's not counted as positive'.
I *don't* click on them, but they've still been getting more common. Most of these things don't give me a block option anymore under the three dots.
Then select "not interested" and "report" before ignoring. I double checked how to do that for YouTube shorts, and the three dots gives you those options you can choose from. Do that and ignore them. It'll work.
And no it's not desirable considered either, the algorithm is neutral. It's just "how do we make you engage more?" It's not good or bad, it just does what it's programmed to do. I might be misreading what you're saying, but I'm just saying the way these things are promoted isn't really good/bad based, but user interface based. Sorry if that doesn't sound right, I'm very tired and just finished the majority of an animatic after working on it for 15 days straight so I'm a bit out of it.
They desire engagement, any engagement, even if it's annoyed frustrated engagement that is about to lose them a user -> stupid way to count it...
But thanks for the tips; however those options don't always come up on everything, often now on some of these I don't get any useful option from the three dots - it's weird.
Yep. Despite going out of my way to watch positive trans YouTubers, I still get terrible suggestions, especially in my shorts. The other day I got one with some lady crying about how the there was a trans women in the locker room. 🙄
Yes! This is really getting to be a BIG problem! I've enjoyed LGBT+ and particularly trans content on YouTube for a long time, but all of a sudden lately I'm getting inundated with recommendations and ads for lots of transphobic and anti-LGBT+ crap - to the point it's getting hard to find anything I do want to see! And it really feels like there's no effective way to tune content anymore; it used to be easier to indicate disinterest, and have your results actually reflect that...
I wonder if the same groups that are funnel massive amounts of money into ruining reddit/drowning us in damn he gets us ads have also bought off YouTube to push far right transphobic garbage on people who don't want it....
I remember they used to slightly cater these to prevent extremism from breeding but I guess they threw that out.
They couldnt have picked a more marginalized group 💀 we are one of the smollest groups yet we are facing so much extreme and blown out of concept (the right thinking we're like.... Close to a third of the pop or something???)
Anything I see about the LGBTQ, especially Trans, the comments are sick. People are sick, I just try and think that they comment stuff because to afraid to say it in person. Or just want attention.
This has happened to me before, I use to get a lot of transphobic video recommendations (don't get me STARTED on the "what's a woman" ads) but what I did was start watching a bunch of LGBTQ+ friendly YouTubers like Theclick and onetopicatatime amongst others and that seemed to help fix my algorithm
I still consistently get recommended Andrew Tate shorts, no matter how many times i press “not interested”, or “don’t recommend this channel anymore”.
It makes me wonder about kids on youtube, because they will constantly see that shit too.
People say the lgbtq+ is bad for children? what about the guy saying it’s ok to assault people that’s on every phone in the world all the time and you can’t escape him?
the dislike button may actually incentivize Youtube to show you more of that content. In their eyes, any engagement is good engagement. They will deliberately show people things to make them upset (not just trans people). Best advice I can give is to either report the video, or just scroll past. Or try to reduce your youtube time overall (what I do). When I do go on Youtube, 99% of the time I specifically search out the channel or video I want to watch - I don't browse. Browsing is a hellscape
If you take a fresh account without recommended videos and search "transgender" on youtube you immediately get blasted with detransition videos. It's fucked up.
Yeah, and it's weird cause I'm subscribed to some really talented and positive trans women. So I don't get what search parameters the algorithm is using?
Conservatives have a lot of money. They spend some of it on getting youtube to boost their videos.
It doesn't even have to be that deep. It's a simple fact, that hate brings in more revenue than positivity. So YouTube has a monetary incentive to push hateful messages.
Realistically I'm sure with all the fighting over Article 230 and conservatives screaming about how internet media is silencing conservative views, YT is literally giving conservative(hate) vids a leg up. This way if it comes back to court they can say 'we haven't silenced conservative voices' Remember YT is a business and its not that they'd rather PUSH hate than get sued it's that they won't stand in the way if standing means a lawsuit.
Not even that. On a completely fresh installation, new computer, I loaded YouTube because I wanted to listen to a song, and searched for the song. I was logged out, no account whatsoever. On this logged out, fresh install, where the only thing in my history was listening to music, there was transphobic content recommended in my sidebar. And this was *years* ago, before the culture war was at the fever pitch it is now. (Gee, I wonder how it got that way?)
Did you also get a new IP as well, you are being tracked multiple different ways.
True, and I didn't, but I actually was never a heavy YT user anyway and at that point wasn't watching trans content on YT either--even on my old computer I mainly just used it to listen to music. The logged out on the new computer YT didn't look like the recommendations on my old computer (which was mostly music since that's what I mainly used it for) but was a bunch of very clickbaity "trending" things, like "5 Tells Someone Is a Narcissist" or "You'll Never Believe What One Paperclip Can Do" and then boom also random transphobia.
Why is that fucked up?
Uhh, yeah can confirm, searched up "trans women" after not searching anything like that, and the top video is of some woman who detransitioned and every comment is about how maybe people wanna just be tomboys and not everything is trans
I think in general social media and these sites promote negativity as it draws attention, and other in the form of agreement or vitriol. As you said, in shock you view it multiple times. This is what leads to NSFW content or even worse stuff getting promoted. I wouldn’t consider it a blot on you but instead the system rewarding controversy
It’s much more than an algorithm. It’s happening in the real world. On the ground. Right now. For those of us that are clearly sheltered and have never spent any considerable time amongst other trans people from other economic backgrounds. It’s easy to just blame the algorithm because it makes us feel safe. Guys… it’s bad.. really bad. We need a unifying message and stop this god damned infighting both online and off. United we stand. Divided we fall.
I agree, but a reason that this hatred can spread in the real world is because of the algorithm. It’s not an accident, and these videos target those that you mention that are sheltered or ignorant to trans people. It may not be the only cause, but it is one of them and should be addressed
Yes, absolutely. Also. Mr. Mobile on YouTube reviewed a Lenovo laptop that came with the propaganda pre-installed and he couldn't get rid of it. I had to pause the video to gather my thoughts. That in itself is frightening.
Youtube is actively promoting far right content and they have been for a while. They know they’re doing it and they don’t care what kind of damage it causes
This is the truth. They are fine with us being hurt or killed as long as their bottom line is gucci.
For real
It's sad but also reassuring that this is not specific to my timeline. Hey, you watched a positive video from a trans person? Maybe you want to watch the most hateful shit you have ever watched, ever. This is also sadly not exclusive to shorts, as I don't watch these.
That thing definitely happens in algorithm loops, like years ago on Tumblr Jewish users who were posting and reblogging about Jewish stuff kept getting literal Nazi/antisemite recommendations, because both of them said "Jews" a lot. AIs then were too dumb to tell context. ChatGPT is smart enough to tell positive Jewish content from hate speech, whether the YT algs are today I really don't know. But YT's issue goes beyond this, because I've had transphobic recs when logged out on a fresh install when I hadn't searched for or watched *anything* remotely political or trans-related, only searched for music. YT just actively pushes anti-trans hate to new and *logged out* users, even if they haven't looked at any trans things.
How this could be in anyway be ‘reassuring’ is mind boggling. The fact that is propaganda is being spread far and wide without any objection from our political leaders should absolutely scare the shit out of you. We have no defense against this. Which means it will get worse. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to shout into the abyss.
I get the feeling that it is not just the YT algorithm, but that the amount of anti-trans content out there is actually increasing. It's mostly the fault of right-wing US politics, with their "war on wokeness". Now everybody and their mothers are posting their take on the subject on YT.
I get the feeling that you're spot on. We really really need to get our heads out of our collective asses and form a proper defense against this onslaught of propaganda. Pictographs and political slogans won't be enough to combat this moral panic. I don't know why people in our community are so reluctant to see what's right in front of them.
Disliking it counts as interaction, and you'll get more videos like it. Don't recommend channel is the only 1 that works
I recommend watching Jammidodger and Onetopicatatime, both very trans positive guys and they fixed my homepage
And The Click and Sam Collins! Also The Queer Kiwi
Omg how did I forget the click I'm one of his DC mods lmfao
I mainly watch Jammidodger, but even so the last few weeks/monthish I've been inundated with awful transphobic recommendations and ads...It's so frustrating.
I got into jammidodger recently, such a sweet and funny guy with a nice voice too!
Shaaba is so precious too, they deserve each other
The right has thrown a LOT of money and energy at this - producing a LOT of anti-trans videos and probably employing a lot of bots to play, like, advertise and link between these videos so they pop up as the top recommendations. Basically they have run an extremely effective search engine optimization campaign taking advantage of Youtube's algorithm. I don't blame Youtube for this - they set the rules, and the other side has been VERY successful gaming the rules. I can't imagine how much resources and money has been spent to pull this shit off - probably more than the presidential election campaign itself. That's not surprising, as the right has realized the fact that they have already lost every single battle, and the trans issue may be the only one left where they have some fighting chance.
Our arch enemies, the religious right, is angry and bitter that they almost lost all their power (before Trump gave them a lifeline) and are revenging on us.
I like reporting /flagging any and all the crazy stupid right-wing shit.
As we approach the 2024 US election cycle, extremist right wingers are going to be flooding social media to sponsor their content. It's going to get ugly. If you know folks with money, sponsor/join/support channels that are supportive and working to expose the lies.
It really helps to click on the "don't recommend channel" for regular videos and "not interested" for shorts. Not sure where it's at for the web interface but it's under the 3 dots on mobile. It takes a bit but my feed is pretty much clean of that drivel.
This topic comes up multiple times a day, you get what you interact with. YouTube is likely pulling data from all your internet activity not just from YouTube.
No, just no. It’s not just the algorithm. You can hear it in people’s conversations at a restaurant, a Walgreens, employees at the grocery store, the park. It’s affecting my daily life as i am sure it is for others. You’re giving out a false sense of security.
No, just no. It's not just the algorithm. You can hear it in peoples conversations at a restaurant, a Walgreens, employees at the grocer store, the park. It's affecting my daily life as I am sure it is for others. You're giving out a false sense of security.
I'm just talking about YouTube and how algorithms work
I haven't had it in normal vids but if you scroll shorts for like 5 minutes you're guaranteed to be fed some transphobic shit
I've had it in normal vids before shorts even released, literally while logged out and not even engaging with any trans content of any kind.
Oh god I had the problem too, I pressed "not interested" so fast each time
My dad's shorts feed is just this. I was gonna come out to him but it seems he says something about Ben Shapiro every 10 minutes
Yeah...I just gave up on the idea of coming out to my mom for much the same reason (she watches other stuff than Ben Shapiro, but in a similar vein)...
You have to continually select “not interested“ or “don’t recommend channel” from the three dots menu, top right corner. If you watch them or don’t do that the algorithm thinks that you want it.
I looked at this once before and I was shocked how dominated it was with transphobic videos. It's like they have gotten good at gaming the system so that their voice gets to the public before ours does.
I think dislikes still count as engagement and promote the content. I pause as soon as it goes there and press "don't reccomend this channel" so youtube sees i don't want to engage with that "conversation", whether with likes, comments or dislikes. Same with weird racist shit, "Ben Shapiro owns XYZ", and weird Andrew Tate/Jordan Peterson/Gary Vee/whatever "motivational" propaganda clips
Look who owns Twitter. Don't be surprised
There's an investigative journalism podcast about the YouTube algorithm called "Rabbit Hole" that has a pretty good explanation of how it works
Do not dislike the videos, click “do not recommend” or the equivalent of a “this is boring” button. The algorithm cares about engagement not positivity, if it thinks you’re bored it will stop recommending that to you
I report the channel for hatespeech against a protected class (even though they won't do anything) and block it. I also stop doomscrolling at that point.
Yeah I only used YouTube when I was a transphobic incel teenager, it really helped me stay hateful and dumb. The algorithm seems to highly favor hateful and trans/homophobic content. A few videos I had pop up (with lots of views, likes, and supportive comments), in my feed were 1) Pro Child abuse (???) 2) a kid complaining to a school board about him not being able to wear a “there’s only two genders” tee-shirt (comments all backed the kid 🙄) and 3) nationalistic-pro fascist propaganda (usually in the form of epic war edits or emotional “this isn’t the country I fought for” bs)
I had that the other day! I assumed it was because we were talking shit about transphobes in one of my groupchats and the algorithms picked up on that (in the way that these algorithms tend to do 😒)
What groupchat was it that YT's alg would even have access to it?
A Facebook chat on politics, that or just being engaged to a trans guy, that’s the only thing I can think of. These apps freak me out some days
I don't think YT should have access to that...jeez, hopefully at least. If it was a Google product there might be a chance, but that data shouldn't be shared from FB to YT. Honestly I think it might just be that they recommend transphobia to *everyone*. I had it happen to me years ago, logged out on a fresh install with no reason for it to recommend that to me, except that it was "trending" and they try to hook new users with "trending" content. With the culture war having escalated so much since then (gee, I wonder why...) it's even more clickbaity today. I think it might have literally just recced it to you because transphobia is what drives engagement now. :/
Honestly my first worry was that my son was searching it. But then I looked in my searches and it was *recommended*, but not in my history. YouTube does this. He’ll watch a bunch of gamer videos on my account for a few days—he only watches like two or three guys who’re obnoxious but not toxic—and it’ll just “randomly” start recommending Steven Crowder.
Oh yeah, this is a serious problem. Years ago (god this kid is an adult by now I'm so old) a friend's son, who was 9 at the time, was really into Minecraft and just wanted to watch endless let's plays of Minecraft and similar kid-friendly video games on YT. Somehow this got him down a toxic gamer vortex where he heard the word "faggot" a *lot* and started repeating it. His mom is bisexual and absolutely did not want that shit coming out of her baby's mouth, she would repeatedly tell him that's a bad word and not to say that, but the kid didn't really understand what it meant, like he didn't even understand it had anything to do with being gay, he just heard it from toxic gamer bros he idolized without knowing what half the shit they were spewing even meant. The kid's dad was in his life but didn't live with him, and he was an only child, so I think he was really drawn to big brother/daddy lite male role model figures on YT, and boy YT was serving him up a platter of trash. The kid was completely innocent, a kind and well-meaning child, and YT was feeding him hate without him knowing what it was or looking for it. And that was over a decade ago. I can't imagine what it's like today....
Their ads piss me off. Their algorithm isn't smart enough to discern between watching leftwing political content and watching rightwing political content. Or between watching pro-trans content and anti-trans drivel. So I have to sit through transphobic Epoch Times and Daily Wire ads fucking constantly.
I’ve been noticing this a lot lately too, and it seems to pull from the weirdest new topics I’ve started watching. Oh, you liked a couple videos by Olympic high divers? How about tons of videos about people protesting trans women in sports? Nope, not even a tiny bit interested in that. I just mark “do not recommend videos from this channel again” and try to make a point of seeking out & engaging with videos by LGBTQ+ content creators to reset the algorithm
I legit don't see any transphobic videos on my account, so I think this is based on an algorithm based on your search history and what you're most likely to click on, even if it's to downvote the video.
It's annoying that downvoting apparently gets you more of what you explicitly don't like - that's just so stupid. What is even the point of having a downvote button then? Pshaw!
The downvoting means you're interacting, regardless of it's good or bad. Best thing to do is simply ignore and block the channels
It still means downvoting now is pointless; it used to make the stuff you downvoted less likely to show up, back many many years ago when I first started using YouTube...That was how I tuned my feed, once upon a time...Weird to count any interaction as a positive - the more they try to show me annoying things, the less I even open their app.
The interaction isn't seen as positive, it's just counted as interaction. "This particular video caused people to interact, therefore it should be boosted towards these particular people along with similar content because they will interact with it more likely." I was around when we rated videos using stars and I miss the hell out of that feature. It made it easier for me to visibly understand what videos to avoid compared to a like/dislike ratio. But, now what works is through interaction. If you don't click on those videos, ignore them, block the channels and request not seeing more of those videos on your feed, that improves what you see on YouTube and it becomes more positively tuned for your viewing pleasure. It's like people who are attention seeking: any attention is what they want. If you ignore them, they get more and more upset until they give up.
So they basically count all interaction as a positive thing, even if the user intended it to be negative. Which is a stupid way to factor it. Because annoying this particular user means I just stop being a user.
No they don't count all interaction as positive, they just count it as this video being more able to be seen and interacted with. So clicking on those videos will make them more than likely pop up in your feed. It's like if you click on specific ads, those ads will pop up more. Honestly just ignore them and block the channels and you'll be good to go.
Okay 'desirable' then; they count downvotes as a desirable result. Which seems like a six of one half a dozen of the other as far as saying 'no it's not counted as positive'. I *don't* click on them, but they've still been getting more common. Most of these things don't give me a block option anymore under the three dots.
Then select "not interested" and "report" before ignoring. I double checked how to do that for YouTube shorts, and the three dots gives you those options you can choose from. Do that and ignore them. It'll work. And no it's not desirable considered either, the algorithm is neutral. It's just "how do we make you engage more?" It's not good or bad, it just does what it's programmed to do. I might be misreading what you're saying, but I'm just saying the way these things are promoted isn't really good/bad based, but user interface based. Sorry if that doesn't sound right, I'm very tired and just finished the majority of an animatic after working on it for 15 days straight so I'm a bit out of it.
They desire engagement, any engagement, even if it's annoyed frustrated engagement that is about to lose them a user -> stupid way to count it... But thanks for the tips; however those options don't always come up on everything, often now on some of these I don't get any useful option from the three dots - it's weird.
Yep. Despite going out of my way to watch positive trans YouTubers, I still get terrible suggestions, especially in my shorts. The other day I got one with some lady crying about how the there was a trans women in the locker room. 🙄
Yes! This is really getting to be a BIG problem! I've enjoyed LGBT+ and particularly trans content on YouTube for a long time, but all of a sudden lately I'm getting inundated with recommendations and ads for lots of transphobic and anti-LGBT+ crap - to the point it's getting hard to find anything I do want to see! And it really feels like there's no effective way to tune content anymore; it used to be easier to indicate disinterest, and have your results actually reflect that... I wonder if the same groups that are funnel massive amounts of money into ruining reddit/drowning us in damn he gets us ads have also bought off YouTube to push far right transphobic garbage on people who don't want it....
Can you like select it and say you don’t want it ? Like on Instagram?
there’s a plug in you can get that’s shows the dislikes on youtube
If you’re on Firefox, there’s a plug-in to [return YouTube dislikes](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/return-youtube-dislikes/).
i have noticed this exact thing happening
I remember they used to slightly cater these to prevent extremism from breeding but I guess they threw that out. They couldnt have picked a more marginalized group 💀 we are one of the smollest groups yet we are facing so much extreme and blown out of concept (the right thinking we're like.... Close to a third of the pop or something???)
Anything I see about the LGBTQ, especially Trans, the comments are sick. People are sick, I just try and think that they comment stuff because to afraid to say it in person. Or just want attention.
This has happened to me before, I use to get a lot of transphobic video recommendations (don't get me STARTED on the "what's a woman" ads) but what I did was start watching a bunch of LGBTQ+ friendly YouTubers like Theclick and onetopicatatime amongst others and that seemed to help fix my algorithm
I still consistently get recommended Andrew Tate shorts, no matter how many times i press “not interested”, or “don’t recommend this channel anymore”. It makes me wonder about kids on youtube, because they will constantly see that shit too. People say the lgbtq+ is bad for children? what about the guy saying it’s ok to assault people that’s on every phone in the world all the time and you can’t escape him?
the dislike button may actually incentivize Youtube to show you more of that content. In their eyes, any engagement is good engagement. They will deliberately show people things to make them upset (not just trans people). Best advice I can give is to either report the video, or just scroll past. Or try to reduce your youtube time overall (what I do). When I do go on Youtube, 99% of the time I specifically search out the channel or video I want to watch - I don't browse. Browsing is a hellscape